15 Flash animations you must see!

Need a little inspiration? Here's Paul Wyatt with 15 outstanding examples of at its best.

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When the history of Flash is written our turn of the century obsession with morphing primary coloured squares into triangles will hopefully be left out. Let's face it we all did it. Flash in the beginning of its shelf life was just a nice little animation program for the web.

Flash has been around longer than you might think. It's now entering its teenage years. Flash has grown up - it's still a bit spotty at times - but is now capable of creating fantastically intricate website interface animations as well as full blown cartoons with texture and depth. Recognised as a serious bit of kit by animation studios the world over, Flash has helped kill off traditional cel animation.

Here we've gathered a collection of linear Flash animations as well as animated interfaces, which should inspire you to go to our tutorials section and try your hand at the program today.

FLASH CARTOONS

Simon is an animator who loves cats. Not surprising, then, that he has three of them and a great interest in British wildlife and painting. His cat cartoons are charming and very funny. Expect the unexpected in this brilliant Flash animation.

Combat wombat is a wombat who's heavily into combat. It's all in the name really. This great little animated Flash trailer for a much-anticipated series of Wombat toons was created by Tom Baker, who we recently profiled here.

Oh come on, this Flash animation is funny. Admit it you laughed. You didn't want to but your inner five year old self forced you to. People falling over has been farcically funny for centuries. Falling dude just does it a lot.

Green Thing is a public service, which inspires people to lead a greener life. Green thing itself is a character that mixes humour with a serious message. You'll be "walking the walk" before this Flash animation is over.

INTERACTIVE FLASH ANIMATIONS

OKAYBOSS is an illustrator and designer based in Sydney, Australia. This brilliantly illustrated site has a terrific Flash parallax scrolling effect, an effect used in animation for decades but given the 21st century treatment.

This bonkers but ingenious site is a great example of full screen Flash animation at its best. Irreverent and witty, it'll be some time before you choose to hit the escape key to exit this delightfully eccentric world.